Contactless spending passes £2bn in July

Monthly contactless card spending has passed the £2bn mark, new figures from The UK Cards Association show.

Contactless payments totalled £2.1bn in July as the number of contactless transactions grew by almost 10% in the month to reach 240 million. 19% of all card payments were made using contactless technology in July.

The milestone comes four months after contactless spending topped £1.5bn in March. In the first six months of 2016, contactless payments totalled £9.27bn.

Total card spending increased to a monthly record of £53.9bn in July, with debit cards accounting for the majority of the rise. There were over 1.2 billion card purchases in the month.

Hotels saw the largest increase in overall card spending between June and July, up 25% to £2.1bn, as the lower value of the pound likely encouraged a greater number of domestic and international travellers. Meanwhile, the value of card spending on foreign currency and traveller’s cheques registered a significant decrease between June and July, falling by 14% to £807m. This follows on from an increase of 27% to £935m between May and June.

Richard Koch, head of policy at The UK Cards Association, said:

“Consumers’ adoption of contactless continues apace, with the number of contactless payments jumping by a tenth in just one month. At over £2bn, contactless spending in July was more than three times higher than the same period last year.”

Spending by sector
Retail sector spending increased by £185m to £25.1bn in July, while service sector spending rose by £286m to £28.8bn.

The debit and credit card share of total retail sales was 77.5% in July.